A WEEK after the evening of betrothal my “Jews” arrive for exhibition. The picture is placed in a separate hall, and a special fee is charged for admission. One half of the net proceeds is for me. At the exhibition there is probably a throng from morning till evening.
I see it only once; but as people look at me more than at the picture, I shall not go again, for why should I be angry for nothing. If my picture were a masterpiece, such as has never been seen in the world till this day, people would rather satisfy that curiosity in virtue of which they go to see “Krao” or the Hottentot who eats live pigeons.
Such a Hottentot am I at this moment. I should be satisfied were I really a poodle; but I am too much of a painter not to be enraged by such degradation of art before a fashionable peculiarity.